Advice on where to live for Hayes, Oxford, and the City

We have a dilemma at home and I have no doubt you can shed some lights and clear our doubts smile

We are moving from SE London to Western London, and are trying to decide where. Both of us work, with one having to commute to Hayes and Harlington every day, and the other having to commute to the City (Cannon Street) 3 days of week, and to Oxford the other two (I know, not exactly simple).

The area around Ealing Broadway sounds like a good option: 10-minute train to Hayes, 32 minutes on the Central line to Bank, and (oh well) 1h30m to Oxford. Primaries seem to be good too - we have a daughter who is 2.5y. Hoping nurseries are good too?

Question is, we are not sure we've exhausted all options and coming from SE, we don't know enough about West London to know if there is a better option than Ealing Broadway?

And another question: If we were to live around Ealing Broadway, what is a reasonable budget for a 2-bed flat? Looking on rightmove I see that something like 1500-1750 should be reasonable, am I being realistic? Any areas in a 1 mile radius to avoid, or is Ealing generally nice?

Do you want to be in London? It seems to me that somewhere in Buckinghamshire on the metropolitan line would make for a speedy commute up the m40 for Oxford, down the m40 for Hayes and on the tube into the city. And schools are good in bucks - including grammars - and it might be a less stressful life than in Ealing Broadway...

Thank you very much freshmint, will check it out Amersham and the other options on the Metropolitan line!

I think the preference would be to be closer to the City than to Oxford, mostly because I expect to be commuting more often to Central London than to Oxford (e.g. it could be a 4-to-1 split). That makes Ealing more appealing with a very short 30-minute commute to Bank. That said, in terms of lifestyle I would definitely prefer countryside than London - this is why we are considering all options before we make the leap.

JullyTheDependableBoot: yes, correct We are considering renting for the next year, then we can look around to buy.

Stick with commuting by train to Hayes...I would avoid driving at all costs. This part of West London is not driver friendly.Ealing is proably the best area unless you want to consider Ruislip which has central, pic and met line as well as Chiltern overground plus hayes but a torturous journey (140) as I think it's the airport bus. Good luck.